I Watch 'Em So You Don't Have To

Movies So Bad They Make You Say "What In The Blazes Did I Just Watch?"

Il Bosco Fuori (Outside The Forest)

aka Last House In The Woods (2006) Italy

I know, I know, I'm still eager for The Walking Dead to get started tonight... but I managed to fit one movie in until my TWD fever takes over... unfortunately it was this one. One, I'd already had to punish myself with one Italian piece of... cinema this week, but dammit it was the next on my DVR and I'd already saved it without watching it about four times. So shoot, here we go. For one, the title kind of copies The Last House On The Left (both versions) and the setup turns out to be a really cheap kind of Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Really REALLY cheap. Only once scene actually made me go 'ewwww' and I haven't had that happen in a while so good on you Italy, you maxed out the gross-o-meter. It is dubbed, however, which adds to the 'meh' factor of a mediocre movie.

We start with a couple dressed up going home. There's something in the road (probably on purpose) and it blows a tire, making the movie-stupid dad crash the car into a tree. He dies but somehow the mother and son are all right. No phone service though of course. Luckily a car is coming - the mother has the son go to the side of the road (smart) and stands in the middle of the road to flag it down (really REALLY dumb). It plows into her, messing her up badly. The driver gets out to look at her, then gets a rock and starts bashing her already mushy head in - making the child scream and run into the woods. The man sees this, but continues with his mushy bashing and finally loads her in the back of his car. Hmm, the front of his car has neither any damage on it or blood - must be one of those miracle no-scratchy scratchy cars. During the <SLOW!> movie we keep seeing cutaways of the kid running through the forest.

One guy with gun beats three with knives stupid...

A woman who apparently is satisfied with no one has broken up with her boyfriend. He shows up at her place and begs her to go for a drive with him. On a deserted road they have sex (this being implied, this film concentrates on icky violence, not icky sex) and afterward begin arguing... again. A car full with three Guidos (That's the Italian equivalent of toughs, right?) show up and grab the girl to rape her and knock out the boyfriend. Just as things are about to get really... interesting, another car comes by (an awful lot of traffic for a deserted forest road) and a man gets out. When the toughs threaten him with a knife, he simply pulls a gun and they take off. He then tells the couple they should come home with him to get help. And this movie would be over if they were smart and said 'No thanks, we'll just drive to a hospital.' But oh no.. we've got 85 minutes of movie to fill up.

This is NOT what I meant about couple's counseling...

The man and his wife seem very accommodating at first - then while they are about to have tea their son comes down the stairs - his face is all bloody. HELLO, WARNING SIGN ANYONE? But the woman ignores it and the mother takes the child back upstairs. She then notices that the husband is about to inject her with something and puts up a fight - and escapes. Briefly. In the woods is a camper and she expects now she'll get some help. Nope. We have the nightmare brothers in here - one has a second head, uh no, actually it's this huge pustule on his neck that makes him always kinked over (bet the actor had a hell of a neck problem by the time the film was done). The other has some sort of very dark port wine stain covering half his face - and I swear I heard one or both say 'hyuk'. No joke, they were actual cartoons. 

They are, of course, the others sons of the couple and the bring her back to the house where she's knocked out. When she wakes we get the cheap TCM version of the family 'dinner' - what they're chomping on (including the little boy) is her ex-boyfriend's leg. She sees he is tied up and unconscious beside her, apparently hasn't bled out yet. One of the older 'boys' grabs a chainsaw and we get this freaky deaky scene where the camera plays with the stupid zoom lens - go out, go in, go out - even in fast forward it was a freaking joke. He has trouble getting the chainsaw started but when he does, for whatever reason he guts her boyfriend - after waking him up first of course because it's more fun that way.

Who's throat do you have to rip out around here to get cable?

Oh goody the three Guidos are back. They've figured where this guy lives and want revenge. They climb over and get inside the house - almost the whole house is covered in plastic HELLO, WARNING SIGN ANYONE? And yes, they stumble upon the carnage. The first Guido is stabbed in the gut so we get an obligatory 'intestines leaking out' scene with, hmm, very little blood. The second Guido thinks he's getting away until 'mama' stabs him in the back. Tsk, tsk, such a waste of food. The third Guido is fighting hard, he's killed the 'father' and is fighting the older 'sons' and this is where my sense of what's horror and what's just gross fought against each other. Remember one son had this baseball sized pustule on his neck? When the Guido strangles him it pops - all over the Guido's face. Not that I liked it before, but I probably will never touch tapioca pudding again. He grabs the girl and they think they're going to make it... oops, they forgot about 'mama' and her knife. Bye bye Guido. The girl runs down to the basement (why the hell... oh just forget it) and finds something... awful. The 'mama' tells the girl it's all her fault - they tried to live peacefully way out in the forest but no, they had to ruin it. She didn't want to give birth to a 'monster'. They couldn't figure out what the hell the kid wanted until he bit and tried to eat his father's finger. Then they had to 'kill' to feed him. They 'found' the other two guys (Where, in some freak show?) so the kid would think he was 'normal' (Uh, what the hell again? How can he possibly think anything.... I mean they have TV he's gotta see... ah hell, let's just finish this pile). Just one little problem - it's probably not such a good idea to call your little kid a 'monster' when he's within hearing distance - he attacks and rips out his mother's throat.

Rapist ALWAYS trumps cannibal...

As the woman runs off again down the now-empty road, we finally find out what happened to the little boy that they kept flashing on through the whole movie - he reached the family home and they decided to make him their son's 'friend' - by taking his arms and legs so he can't escape. The little boy picks up his friend to go ??? and thankfully, blissfully, the movie ends.